


The Tiger and the Nightingale

by Daxii



Category: Free!
Genre: Cancer, Death, Grief, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-28
Updated: 2015-05-28
Packaged: 2018-04-01 16:51:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4027513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daxii/pseuds/Daxii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Makoto loses his mother to cancer and Dax's real life feels leak into fic-form.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Tiger and the Nightingale

There was literally nothing Haruka could say.

There wasn’t anything he felt he could do.

Even reaching out for Makoto’s hand… he felt like he might break.

So he just stands leaning on the wall outside the room, eyes damp and fingers trembling, but he’s not going to cry yet.

It’s so sterile it’s stinging at his raw eyes. There’s a distant beeping, the sound of rolling wheels down the endless miles of faded cream linoleum. Every voice in the vicinity is hushed and whispered. Behind closed curtains, there’s the laboured wheeze of a breath or a shift on scratchy fabric.

And absolutely none of it is enough to drown out the gentle sobbing coming from Room 11, but then suddenly, one voice leaves the trio of whimpers, and Haru hears slow, wobbling footsteps.

“Haru?” his voice doesn’t even crack.

Haru wants to tell him off for leaving, scold him for worrying about _him_ when really, if there was any time for him to be selfish, it’s now. But he can’t, because it’s Makoto, and his eyes are still shimmering with his sadness when Haru finally looks up at him.

“Hey…” he doesn’t know what to do with his hands. One’s reaching out to hold him, but he reels it back in.

Makoto chuckles and laces their fingers, bringing his other hand to Haru’s waist. “Are you alright?”

Haru frowns. “Are _you_ alright?”

“No,” Makoto says, light and easy, leaning back against the wall and twirling Haru to face him, hugging around his back so he leans on him.

Of course he’s fucking not.

“I’m so…” sorry? Just how useless a word is that?

“I know, I know,” Makoto soothes, and Haru just nuzzles into his neck.

“But she can’t… but she… she can’t.”

Makoto’s crying again now, just little tears Haru can feel running down his cheeks to Haru’s forehead. “I know… it doesn’t feel real.”

They were prepared. They knew it was coming. Nothing was ever going to be right again. But this… this wasn’t in the script. It wasn’t meant to happen like this. They should have had _months_ …

“At least it was quick,” Makoto hums. “She never had time to worry.”

But how are they supposed to know that? She could barely say their names, who knows what she was thinking. Haru suspects she’s been worrying for over a year, since that very first trip to the doctor. He’s seen it in her face, every time she looks at her children. Makoto, Ren… and Ran, her little girl she’ll never see grow up.

“We still _need_ her…”

“I know… we’ll always need her…”

**Author's Note:**

> My best friend's mum died of lung cancer this morning... she was supposed to have years left, not curable but keeping it under control, but then complication after complication and she was just too sick for treatment. It all spiraled downhill so fast and... sad. Really fucking sad.
> 
> Rest in peace.


End file.
